Bradda Head Lithium (LSE:BHL) — Investor Presentation

0:00 Good afternoon, and welcome to the BRADDA HEAD LITHIUM Investor Presentation. Throughout this recorded presentation, investors will be in listen only mode. Questions are encouraged and will be submitted at any time via the Q and A tab situated on the right hand corner of your screen. Simply type in your questions and press send. The company may not be in a position to answer every question it received during the meeting itself. However, the company can review all questions submitted today and publish responses where it's appropriate to do so. Before we begin, I'd like to submit the following poll. I'd now like to hand you over to Ian Stalker, executive chairman. Good afternoon, sir.

0:30 Good afternoon, and, good afternoon to everyone listening to this presentation. It's been a little while since BRADDA HEAD has put its name out there in the public domain in many ways, because lithium, for the past two years or thereabouts, has been a no go area. It's been pretty depressing in actual fact. But now, as you can see from the title on the slide that's gonna come up, lithium is on the move. Lithium demand is on the move. And as the headline says, so are we as BRADDA HEAD LITHIUM. And this presentation today will talk about just exactly what we're doing in The USA. And keep that in mind. It is The USA. It's not any far flung country that's in the back of beyond with all sorts of challenges. We're in a country where lithium is in demand.

1:18 Lithium is used in the battery, industries over there in terms of the car supply chains that exist, and we are encouraged to be successful in our lithium opportunities. Okay. Let me get on to the slides now if I can. We're gonna talk about the, new portfolio we've got in, Arizona, and we'll kick off. Of course, you can see the the the opening page. The second slide there is the disclaimer, which I'm sure everyone will be familiar with. Basically says, look. Take everything I say with a pinch of salt, and then we can move on to what's happening in The USA. Let me just make this full for myself so I can see it. There you go. Oops.

2:03 So Whistlejacket is a project that we have now got an earning with with one of the world's largest mining companies. That is Rio Tinto Mining Group. In The US, it's known as KEX, Kennecott, Exploration. They were in conversation with us for the previous roughly ten months. We met at the PDAC, the big mining conference in Toronto last year, and they had been previously working alongside us in our own San Domingo. And the slide that's on the presentation here, you can see San Domingo in the bottom right hand corner, Whistlejacket just up further in the left hand side, with basin next to it there. So they had come to us and had been following what we were doing in San Domingo, gave us a few ideas of what they would have done with it, etcetera, but then went and did their own thing in Whistlejacket.

2:55 And when the results of their Whistlejacket became known to them, they came to us and wanted to talk about potentially a joint venture. And it is a joint venture. It's an earn in option, which I just wanna highlight confirms that Rio Tinto is not walking away from this just yet. They are interested in what's gonna be done there. And I think investors looking and listening to me today, should recognize that we weren't just a random pick, that the time it took, RTZ was partly because they wanted to make sure that we were a company that had the skill set, the background, the experience, and the wherewithal to undertake this whistlejacket project while still running our San Domingo. I just wanna highlight from this slide that we've got excellent infrastructure, which goes without saying in The States. You can see the road, outlines there on the map that is in the presentation.

3:49 We have synergies with our existing San Domingo project. The distance between the two is not significant. We our office our main office in The USA is in Wiki up there, up the top, so it's very close for us to access. And in this area, there is an established mining culture and a supportive, more supportive than it's ever been partly because of the, commentary that comes out of The USA. They're keen to get their own raw materials in The USA, and that support has been, more and more, clear to us that they want us to move and move quickly. And I would just bring up that last comment I've got at the bottom there. For because we've kept our crystal dry, we didn't spend copious amounts of money. We never had to go to the market to raise any money, so we don't have huge amounts of shares out there. We're pretty tightly held, which will come out at the end. But for us now, with this Whistlejacket project being in The USA, it is one some small step for The USA lithium, but it's a giant step for BRADDA and our investors.

4:52 So I'll move on now to the next one. And there you go. The Whistlejacket project. There's the earning. As defined here, we can acquire up to 60% of the Hard Rock lithium project. We are the operator. It consolidates our hub in that area with San Domingo and Basin. And, obviously, the shared infrastructure, shared management, development synergies, more meters to be drilled, etcetera, etcetera, allow us to be much more competitive and cost conscious when it comes to managing both projects. We've got excellent access as we talked about before. We've got a very large amount of acreage under our control previously by RTZ or Kennecott. 19 diamond drill holes were done as well as a a range of smaller holes.

5:37 And some of the highlights there are 41 meters at 1.22% LI two o, and then a separate hole at 19.5 meters at 1.65. So you can see significant grades and significant intersections, and I can tell you like ours in San Domingo close to the surface. I would remind everyone that, a couple years ago when we were drilling our own San Domingo project, we put out a diamond drill hole of just about 30 meters running at 1.64% LI two o. At the time, I think it was the third or fourth best hole, identified during that year of high lithium exploration. So when you put that into the mix along with the RTZ numbers I've just discussed there, you can see why we're excited about this area. The inland structure, 51% for 5.5 over three years, of which, 750,000 is guaranteed to be spent in year one.

6:32 That 750,000 has been guaranteed by two of the directors, if you like, of, BRADDA HEAD. One is myself, and the other one's a gentleman called Jim Mellon, who some of you are familiar with. And I think if nothing else, that highlights the confidence and scope we see here for a decent return on our own investment, never mind other investors coming in. There's no upfront cash or equity to the vendor, and that money is spent in the ground. And the thesis is pretty clear. It's a tier one jurisdiction area with a tier one partner. I would hesitate to say it's a tier one project, but why would RTZ give it away? But it's a project of value, and they want to stay with it. They've got bigger projects to deal with, and that's fine. For us, this is the right size in the right place with the right partner.

7:18 So let me just move on. And I I just before I I move to the next slide, it complements San Domingo, as I mentioned, and the fact in Arizona too, we have our basin project, which I will talk about shortly. There's a crystal jacket pegmatite swarm. You can see it in this particular slide. There's a range of holes that you can see identified with a little white circle and yellow lines and as well as some of the surface samples they've taken, and you get a fair idea of this concentration of the spodumene in that area. The red line is the main highway. It's an excellent road. And adjacent to us, interesting enough, is the copper mine, which has been there for probably about, I don't know, almost a hundred years now. So it's a mining territory, good access. And so, for example, one of the things the reason I mentioned the copper mine is adjacent because we're adjacent to us should, god forbid, any accidents take place. We've got, excellent medical facilities as well as laboratory facilities, etcetera, trained people in the area. So we are very lucky to have that complementary skill sets and, infrastructure adjacent to us. So we're we're really moving now with permitting.

8:28 We've been talking to the BLM and the state, authorities for allowing us to move forward with our environmental plan, which is underway, and then getting the drilling started in the not too distant future.

8:44 It's very impactful for us. We've developed a a a robust stage exploration program already to help us through this systematic advance of the Whistlejacket, project. We'll be putting out some press releases about some of the work done previously because it adds to the excitement of what we've got there. We will be starting with the basics to begin with going back and doing a little bit more mapping, including some more surface sampling while we negotiate the drilling contract, which is well advanced as you can imagine. We've been talking about this for a long while, but it only came through in terms of fruition, in the last two weeks or so. And indeed, we still wait. I should tell everyone on the call here, we still wait for shareholder approval. That's requested for the February 17.

9:30 There's a general meeting being held. All shareholders have been advised. We've sent them a note saying, appreciate your time, your patience, and your support, and please vote for the resolution. So that should be completed by the seventeenth, which allows us then to move with speed because it allows us to bring in the money, the convertible I talked about, the 1,500,000 that's come from both of us. It allows us to bring that in and get things moving quickly. I just think it's important also with the last line in the slide to highlight a disciplined cost efficient operating approach. One of the things we've learned, and probably no surprise with people listening to my accent, is we are careful with our funds. We do not waste them. It is not for our enjoyment. It is for the benefit of shareholders that we spend the money, and we move on to projects like this. And one of the reasons it took along well, as everyone can probably imagine, we are not the biggest market cap in the world. We've got a relatively small one. So the deals we had to do were reflective of the kind of size of company we were. So for us to get this deal with, RTZ, KEX is an absolutely stunning result for us and, I think, for the shareholders.

10:41 So everyone should be encouraged. There we go in terms of next door to us is the San Domingo project, the one we talked about. For those who have been shareholders for a little while, some of the names in there, Midnight Owl, Loan Giant, etcetera, will be well known to them because we have drilled out and had some interesting intersections. But further than that, during the period of, shall we say, the tough times or the dull times in the lithium market, we continue to do basic and good quality work in that area. And now that we've also been looking at the Whistlejacket project with some of the results that RTZ got, we're able to know, if you like, reassess some of the mineralization stratigraphic positions that the lithium is in. And so we are very keen to go back in there.

11:29 We have a high priority target in Dragon, which you will see also in this slide. We're looking to move there with, further drilling in that area. So we are hoping in the next, I guess, six, twelve months, you can see Dragon down the bottom left hand side, to be adding resources from there into what we hope will be further resources associated with Whistlejacket. So the combination is really another bonus for us, And I think that's what helped us convince RTZ to do the deal with us. Just wanted to remind everyone on board, because lithium is on the move. You've seen that the lithium concentrate price has gone from a low of around about $600 a ton to about 2,003, $2,400 a ton now. So four times it's low.

12:16 That's why everyone's now having another look at lithium and why we now are in a position to move and move quickly. But it also brings back the fact that we have a compliant resource in our clays. We already have almost 3,000,000 tons of lithium carbonate equivalent. We one of the reasons we didn't need to go for money is we were fortunate enough during the high part of the initial second wave on lithium to get a royalty payment from a company called LRC, which has now been sold out. And that kept us in funds over the last few years and was nondilutive. But we have an extensive land package here in the clay system, and that 2,800,000 will grow in terms of size. So it is a strategic resource. Make no mistake about it. Over and above the pegmatites that I like because of the ease to bring into production and the speed to bring into production and the ability to get a product that's sell on the market reasonably cheaply, we still have this strategic package at Basin, and it is a super package. We also have been working there in the background with our environmental permitting. So we have submitted our operational plan, and that permitting should come through in the next month or so, allowing us to go back in and do some more drilling as we see fit.

13:30 But our concentration, I have to be honest with everyone, will be in the pegmatites for the very reason I've just given. We will bring that to the market in terms of a production opportunity quicker than we would do in the clays. But that clays is not without value. That's the message I want to leave everyone with. We also have brines, and they have become quite an exciting, go to story for lithium supply, etcetera, in The States. The one that's shown in the bottom there is the Texas, Louisiana, brine system, which we've got certain licenses in, and you can see the grades have been sampled close to 500 PPM per per liter of lithium. So good grades.

14:16 And there is a lot of attention. You can see Exxon, etcetera, being mentioned in the slide. They are busy with their direct lithium extraction technology with a view to putting in there is actual pilot plants up and running and running successfully, I have to say. So we have got a strategic land package there in this smack over district, and, I think it's fair to say we get several calls on the opportunity that exists there. Secondly, we're over in Pennsylvania. Very similar story there. Standard lithium are busy, putting a a project together, but you can see the similar grades. So in terms of lithium and demand, these are areas infrastructure's already in place because of the old oil and gas operations. So there is a series of pipelines existing.

15:03 Again, for, someone who is a direct lithium extraction, technology company, these are interesting licensees, and we certainly have had conversations on that topic. The other thing I wanted just to highlight to move on to it was, of course, The USA itself. What you can see over there is what I talked about previously on the right hand side, the spodumene costs that have moved and the lithium carbonate costs, lithium carbonate being a final product, spodumene concentrate being an intermediate product that you sell onto a refinery. But those values are sufficiently interesting to make projects like ours in The USA, which is why I said I highlighted at the beginning, very, very attractive. The USA has designated lithium as a strategic

15:49 and critical mineral under the Defense Production Act. The US federal policy supports domestic lithium production. The US government backing has been demonstrated by support for some of the bigger, lithium developments, including Thacker Pass. And the recent legislative aims to strengthen supply chain security, etcetera, etcetera. The big one is that last one. Multiple funding pathways are available. Our group, and the team that I work with, and there are a great bunch of guys over in The States, one of the guys is, by background, a lawyer who got the geology bug and came and joined us as a, an initial sampler, sample preparation, core cutter, etcetera. But his previous background, that legal administrative background, has made him an ideal guy to enter discussions with the US Department of Energy and Department of Defense.

16:42 And those conversations are moving along, I think, at the the appropriate pace. And the opportunity there is for, attracting grants in some instances, loans in some instances, and investments into us from The USA departments. And we are, now with the whistlejacket, a much more attractive proposition. And so I I think it's a case of watch this space, to be honest. That is just a slide that came from the historical ones. Just wanted to highlight where we are in Arizona and Nevada. You can see us there with our projects identified, and you can see how close we are to the Californian battery demand. And adjacent to us is, of course, Silver Peak in terms of the, brains. That's a producer at the moment, and you have a TLC with the Clays busy building their operation, Thacker Pass, etcetera. So it is an industry that is in demand in The USA.

17:41 We're there. We've got the pegmatites. We can get to the market quickly. So listen. It is a genuine good investment scenario. That's the guys who work I work with. You can see Danamec, Jim Mellon, Alex Barelli, Ewan Jenkins, and then Piot is our CFO. Hugo's our senior project manager on its ground, plus Ian and, another geologist. Strong but nimble operational team that now have the ability to move and delighted to be moving forward into this new lithium environment. Capital structure that I touched on to begin with, board and directors, 20%. And remember, we've put in the convertible loan note, which I think, again, just highlights what we believe is a great opportunity, and that's why we're keen to invest in it. But you can see the other group of people we have there, Zenith Minerals owns 11%.

18:29 We've got some interesting, shareholders, individual and private, small institutions, and about 35% free float in many ways. And then that really concludes the presentation. I've had the opportunity of taking you through it. I hope it's been thorough enough, and I hope you found it of interest. And I'll hand back now to, you, Lily. That's great. Thank you very much for your presentation. Ladies and gentlemen, please do continue to submit your questions just by using the q and a tab situated on the right hand corner of your screen. Just while the company take a few moments to review those questions submitted today, I'd like to remind you that recording of this presentation along with a copy of the slides and the published q and a can be accessed by your investor dashboard. As you can see, we have received a number of questions throughout today's presentation. But please ask you to read out the questions and give responses where appropriate to do so, and I'll pick up from you at the end. Okay. Thank you very much. So the questions are, first one, what are your plans for the year ahead across your portfolio?

19:24 So I've highlighted, we are very keen now to get moving on the pegmatite story. And part of the reason behind that is our earlier work in our own pegmatites not only identified the potential for some significant resource there, that's before we get whistlejackets. So, again, I remind everyone the opportunity of the combination. But the test work we've done highlighted that we could produce a concentrate of sufficient value by gravity means only that we could sell into the marketplace. And by gravity, I mean a limited amount of water usage, and water is one of those challenges within The USA, in that part of The USA, but allows us to get there at a very low capital cost and a very fast entry. So our plans are to move ahead with the pegmatites, get our portfolio for the basins ready to go, and look at maybe joint venturing, etcetera, on the brains.

20:15 Will I continue to or we continue to look at other acquisitions? The answer is yes. Our little company, I think, is demonstrated by the Whistlejacket acquisition that we are on the lookout. We continue to on the lookout. Historically, people like myself and Jim have not been restricted just to necessarily one commodity, although it's important we do focus on it, and that is the case in BRADDA HEAD. But there are always opportunities, and the markets that we are in today, give us ample opportunity of picking up other

20:47 assets. Cash position, well, as I mentioned, we have got convertible loan note. It will be I believe it will be approved in the February 17 at our general meeting, which means that we are well funded for the immediate future. We are a small junior company, of course, within the expiration remit. Therefore, we don't make any money. I'm just repeating what's obvious. So at some stage, we will go out, but it's not imminent, and we're in a good position and a good environment to take that initiative when we're ready. Is the company minded to sell any of their assets to focus on and help fund their exploration activities? Yes. That remains that we cannot cover every single one with the intensity that each of those projects demands.

21:37 We like the spodumene one, I e, the Whistlejacket, San Domingo, then we like Basin, and brains become third. So I think just by saying that, you can get an idea of of what we'd be willing to consider with other companies. And there are interested parties, And maybe just watch this space as well as we move forward. Has Joey Wilkins left the team? Joey, did leave us at the, just after our completion of the deal with RTZ. He, during the the the lean time, shall we say, we encouraged Joey and all of us to look elsewhere to make sure their time was filled up and not demand as much money from BRADDA, and we kept our costs tight. But Joey has remained on as an adviser. He is a supporter of us, and I have to give him, significant kudos for the way he's conducted himself both as COO and going forward. It's been excellent.

22:29 What does the work program look like for going forward for whistlejack? We've submitted our exploration plans to the various authorities with the environmental demand, and we wait to get those approved. But we want to be on the ground, almost immediately. We have to spend that $750,000, to get us to the 51% level. So we are on the move. That's all I can tell you. Doing it correctly as we always have done, making sure that we don't trip over our own feet when it comes to documentation, permitting, etcetera, etcetera. What is your strategy in terms of getting to production or bringing in partners as such? I I think of, Jen, I've I think I've answered most of that. We've done some test work, not, huge on our existing, pegmatites.

23:15 We will continue to do a little bit more, based on the drilling results we get, but our intention is focusing on the pegmatites, bringing them to a level where we get a resource, compliant resource, which I think is not a million miles away based on the drilling that's been done to date. And, BRAD, you can imagine, RTZ has done a fantastic job of of tooling out their opportunity. Obviously, within the the budget constraints that their business allowed them, but they've done very well with it. And so that amount of information's available to us. With that and with what we've done in Santo Domingo, we can have a, I think, a strategic drilling campaign and move that resource along relatively quickly. And then as I mentioned, we'll look at the metallurgical test work. Will we bring in other partners? Well, we'll see. You know, it's in this business, you never see never. I think it's one of my fellow countrymen, James Bond, once said.

24:09 Acquiring new assets is great, but the value is created by generating cash flow, 100%. Anything we look at would be us looking at near term production opportunities, and that's why I keep going back and reminding myself and everyone else for that matter that the way we're approaching it is to try and get Whistlejacket and San Domingo to a production label sooner rather than later. And I think, Lily, that completes the questions that, have been put before me. Ian, thank you for answering all those questions you have from investors. And, of course, the company can review all questions submitted today, and we'll publish those responses on the Investor Meet company platform. Just before redirecting investors to provide you their feedback, which I know is particularly important to the company, can I please just ask you for a few closing comments? Sure.

24:56 Without sounding like a broken record here, I would just let everyone know, the comments that we made right at the beginning. Lithium demand is on the move, and so are we. And I don't think there's many lithium companies can be as active as we are. There's a few around to choose from, but if you like the concept of lithium being a demanded material in The USA, if you like the idea that spodumene, I. E, pegmatites are the fastest way to get to production, if you think we've got a decent team, then this is the business to invest in. Simple as that. Ian, thank you for updating investors today. Now please ask investors not to close the session as you'll now be automatically redirected to provide your feedback in order that the management team can better understand your views and expectations. This may take a few moments to complete, and I'm sure be greatly valued by the company. On behalf of the management team of BRADDA HEAD LITHIUM LIMITED, we'd like to thank you for attending today's presentation, and good afternoon to you all.

25:51 Thank you.